The Emperor of Everything

Their barges weren’t stopped, as Ruiz had predicted, though as they moved out into the sunlight again at the far end of the fortress, several hard-looking men came out onto an overhanging balcony and gestured ambiguously at them. The pirates spoke together in soft voices, laughing softly, then went back into the fortress.

Finally they passed through a tidegate, out into the labyrinthine waters of SeaStack. Overhead, the towers twisted up into the darkening sky, blotting out most of it. The origins of the stacks seemed even less imaginable, seen up close. In places they rose from constructed bases, or at least shaped metal shone through the crust of age that covered everything. In other places, they seemed wholly natural in their random upward growth, stone and dirt and ancient trees hanging from the terraces that overhung the channels. The bases of the towers were riddled with caves and entryways, some at water level and some higher, some lit by brilliant security lights, others dark and forbidding.

The others stared, openmouthed. The craft that plied the scummy waters ranged from battered junks with painted sails and slave-powered sweeps, to the newest skimmers and needleboats. The people were as motley as their craft, representing every human variant. An occasional alien drew gasps of astonishment from the Pharaohans, who had seen few aliens during their stay in the slave compound.

Ruiz concentrated on remembering the route they took into the heart of SeaStack, and on trying to relate the landmarks to his memories of the pirate city.

Chapter 8

Corean cursed, a low, bitter, monotonous stream. She hung upside down from the acceleration webbing, unable to see out because of the mud and vegetation plastered across the sled’s armorglass bubble.

The craft shifted and subsided slightly. She cut short the curses. Time for that later, after she had somehow prevented the sled from sinking into the bog.

She slapped at the webbing releases, and fell sprawling onto the ceiling. The sled lurched again, and she felt a touch of fear. How deep was the bog?

She examined herself, waggled her limbs. She discovered no broken bones — though she ached everywhere.

She crawled to an upside-down flight panel, and peered at the readouts. She cursed again. The sled was dead; the blast that had grazed it had thoroughly fried the power and control systems.

She heard a clicking rattle and looked around. Marmo was carefully easing himself to an upright position.

“Are you functional?” she asked.

“I believe so,” he replied. “How is the Moc?”

“Don’t know.” She got up and picked her way across the ceiling, back toward the cargo bay. When she pulled herself up through the hatch, she saw the Moc, standing by the burst-open lock. One midarm hung by a thread of chitin.

The insectoid bondwarrior seemed otherwise undamaged, and the midarm would regenerate — though the injury cut its firepower in half, since its midarms carried implanted energy weapons.

It swiveled its head to look at her, and she saw from the nervous rasping movements of its mandibles that it was preparing for combat. It bowed its head, a lightning flicker of movement, and bit off the encumbering remnant of its arm.

“What is it?” Corean moved to the lock and cautiously peered out through a crevice. She saw, beyond the cattails that bordered the bog, a line of peasant guardsmen staring at the sled. They wore plumed hats and carried archaic weapons: pikes, harquebusses, crossbows. Behind them an armored individual sat an elegant mech charger. The armor imitated steel plate, but Corean was certain it was of more advanced design, since it seemed not to weigh heavily on its wearer. The rider wore an ornate broadsword in a sling across the back. The charger, looking something like a steel horse with claws instead of hooves, seemed equipped with more potent armament; two blackened orifices opened in its breastplate.

Corean narrowed her eyes. Bad enough that she was stranded in the middle of a mudhole — all she needed now was an irate local squire.

The armored person rose in the stirrups and called out. “You in the sled! Come out, hands empty and in plain sight.”

“Oh, sure,” she said in a low voice. She settled her helmet on her head, flipped down the visor, and checked the toggles that held the collarpiece securely to the rest of her armor.

“Last chance,” shouted the squire. Moments passed, and then flame coughed from the charger’s breast.

A spinner charge hit the lock and fragmented, sending a hail of glass slivers into the bay. The Moc jerked, then looked at her. The slivers had shredded its doublet, but bounced off its carapace, which was as dense as the armor she wore. One of its great compound eyes had taken a grazing hit, and thick yellow fluid welled from the wound.

Corean bared her teeth. The peasants were moving forward, sinking knee-deep in the mire, raising their harquebusses. “First,” she said, “kill the rider. Then the others.”